


Crux

by Cauilflower, Newance



Series: Wastelanders [1]
Genre: Burns, Drug Use, General Discomfort, Original Character(s), flies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-15
Updated: 2018-08-15
Packaged: 2019-06-27 22:25:12
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,335
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15694566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cauilflower/pseuds/Cauilflower, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Newance/pseuds/Newance
Summary: Following a tragic meth making accident





	1. The Fly

She could have been mistaken for a corpse. Skin was looking balmy like wax, like a body cooking in a van. She couldn't move if she wanted too. She was catatonic, rendered so by the cocktail of drugs in her system. Mixing drugs never did go well for her. Not much fun to shit your brains out while you’re rolling. But in this situation she had no other choice. The pain would have driven her to find something sharp enough to die on. And now she's corpsey catatonic in the passenger side seat of her van. 

Lord of the Flies. It was a book Noah had with all of his other ‘before time’ relics. Choof never touched the book but now the words were hung like a road sign in her idle mind. Black and iridescent green swarmed her eyes her mouth, nose and in great congregation near the arm. She felt them stampede the nerve damaged flesh. They lapped up the plasma from the weeping burn like the wretched to aqua-cola.

Her pupils were blown and stared unfocused at the arm. Is it really that red or is that the sand from when I fell. it felt like it had eviscerated the muscle in her forearm. But it was the only thing she could have done to put the fire out. Smother it in sand. 

Consumed by buzzing. A feeling in her jaw like the sound of scissors. She was overwhelmed in the bugs. The drugs made her wonder if she was actually dead. Just awake to witness such a miserable scene. Poor dead cunt, shouldn't have tried to smoke while cooking ice. Stupid,easy pickings and big score for whatever buzzard finds her first. 

She was about to pass out. She felt panic seize up her chest but she couldn't physically do anything about it. She was either gonna die or wake up and wish she’d died. She drew together her remaining focus and with her unmarred hand pulled her goggles from her forehead and over her eyes. The flies scattering in a high pitched frenzy up her nose and into her ears, but they were finally out of her eyes. She could at least see her maker.


	2. Bleach Bath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much Leo for letting me use your OC and helping me write her dialogue for this chapter!

Oh, the bleach stung somethin fierce. She could tell even with the narcotic drip in her wrist. Nimbus was sat behind her in a stool, her thighs clamped tight around Choof’s waist to keep her still.

“Look, girly. I need you to hold still or things are gonna get a hell of a lot worse before they get better.” Nimbus paused and frowned, “they’ll be gettin’ worse no matter what, but if you keep yourself fuckin still it’ll be better before you know it.”  
The words echoed in her head, she could recognize them but in her drug-induced lethargy she had to chew on them to understand what had been said. She considered giving a response but figured she had missed the window of opportunity. Her vision was swirling, even just looking at the expanse of grey concrete floor was making her feel motion sick.  
“Bite this,” she cautioned, putting a cloth between Choof’s teeth. “I’m goin back in, you need at least one more rinse before I could even think of clearin you… Jesus, girl, what were you thinking?” 

 

She braced herself as best she could. Her left hand gripping tight onto the canvas of Nimbus’s pant leg she sucked a sharp breath through her nose.  
It had been a shot in the dark when she made the trip to the Iron Tank’s compound. Sure it was their main base of operations but this entire side of the wasteland was their territory and she had been looking at a 70% chance that she’d be pulling in to an empty station. Figured if she did she’d just die and then Nimbus’d be really furious. 

However when she did pull up she had watched jovial smiles turn to frantic faces and she was wretched from the van and immediately rushed inside. The whole thing felt hazy, like it could have passed for a dream, had she not woken up and still been horrifically disfigured.  
Nimbus was pissed, still was. Talking more at her than too her about how she could have died, could have come for help sooner. Asking about who did this and watching warily as Choof choked out a laugh and told on herself. 

She chewed on the rag in her mouth to avoid fidgeting. Felt like she was in a shell, getting only a vague idea of the type of pain she’d be in without the drugs. Nimbus scrubbed hard, sloughing off strips of skin from raised boils and lifting her arm up to scrub at her ribs. The bleach stung, every time a new cup of it was poured over the wound she felt her body tense, in response Nimbus would tighten her grip on her waist. 

Choof knew how fucked she would have been without the drip. This was horrific. Her first taste of a wasteland injury. No one who lived out here got out in one piece.  
“M’ gonna look wicked.” She said around the rag in her mouth. She was trying to stay lighthearted, it was easier with the drugs. She hoped Nimbus would keep her on them until she was better. The moment she’d be off them this all would become too real.  
“You’re a dumbass” Nimbus said behind her, but there was no venom in it.  
“-But you might.”  
She moved to sit in front of Choof, cornering a clean rag with her thumb and scrubbing into the burn over her chin and cheek. The sensation made her left brow twitch.  
“I hate that.” Nimbus looked up briefly before focusing again on scrubbing the burn.  
“You harass one nerve ending and another one somewhere else gets all sympathetic.” She let out of huff that Nimbus interpreted as a laugh. 

She dropped the last rag into a bucket that Choof had been avoiding making eye contact with, and stood up. Choof leaned against the table on her left and watched Nimbus wash her hands in the basin. When she came back over she adjusted the IV. Choof had a vague idea of what she was doing, the drip got faster inside the small chamber and she felt a wave of warmth lull her back. The good shit. Awfully kind of her to gas her up for this part. She spent the next few minutes wrapping the wound. The sensation was Present to say the least. Tight and noticeable, but it would keep it from getting all putrid again.  
“Hand’s gonna be scrap for awhile. Gonna need lots’a work to get back to where you were before, but I can help with that.” 

Nimbus was a gem. Standing up again she guided Choof’s now-wrapped arm through the sleeve of a blue paper gown, walking behind her to tie the garment shut.  
“Stay awake, need you to take an antibiotic in a second.” She added before pulling the tie from Choofs hair, letting the sweaty tangled mess drop behind her. Registered something about how She’d wash her hair tomorrow after she got some rest. She took her antibiotic and slumped bonelessly as Nimbus scooped her up like she weighed nothing, long legs dangling as she was carried.

Nimbus set her down in a cot and she watched her set the IV bag back onto a pole at her bedside. She even pulled the thin blankets over her and felt the deep cut of something so familiar in her gut. Something not as grim as this but just as safe.  
“Cheers mate.” she said with her eyes closed. The exhaustion was being exacerbated by the drugs. “Help yourself to me whole fuckin’ van.” She snickered. 

Nimbus exhaled through her nose and dropped her hand on top of her head, stroking gently. “Will do, honey… but I’m only watchin’ it temporarily. No offense, but that van is a sight for sore eyes.”


End file.
